Eternal Recurrence

History spun, remixed, a rerun

with the same needs advertised

eight minutes an hour. Can one break free

( . . . over and . . . )

of love, requited and not,

( . . . over and . . . )

or oregano disguised as pot,

(. . . over and . . . )

bitterness that turns heart to rot?

( . . . over and . . . )

Cheaters go free / cheaters get caught,

saliene creeks wet cherried cheeks,

the same leaders, the same freaks:

demongraphics both natured and nurtured

eternal,

while the searchers search

for an abba-ca-end to a mortal curse.

Curse ye gods and Satans but stray clues

remain: an onerous protocol, legendary

recipes of what cooked before -

and will again, recipes worn by

some like a shawl, recipes of

filial forbearance, demented

tenets from beyond the grave,

and broken-stringed puppets,

limp and lank, decorate the now,

venerated like truth. Utopia is

a "going-to", so start your steppin',

sheltered by fronds, sleeping in

nipa huts, leaves turning

fuzzybeautiful, highlighted and bathed

in rhe sweet breath of dusk. From close up,

these leaves are

mosaics that show things as they are:

discrete pixels of nearly nothing,

colors that blend and flash

as life goes by.

Aging

Vinagered pupils,

fluffing the Law of Fives and

a gaze once youthful.

Without the Salve of Water

Your job broke down car
the stars from afar
all dancing and fancing
and laughing at your
life that you're half-
way in way in way in and
so far no sight no sight
no sight of the shore
you reach for the gun to
take down a few more.

Where is family in all this?
What role does the unattainable play?
Who would poke holes in strangers like this?
Will they find peace where they lay?

Opening fire in a place where it never rains
is the cruelest cut
for without the salve of water
nothing ever heals.
Clearly this is a long road -
a life only hinted in my run-on above -
and what can the remaining do?

The mirage of life shimmers,
real and untouchable,
now what can the remaining do?
What can the remaining do?

Yet Graceful Reprise

The light can not hold forever
and a nightwashed blue awaits
the reprise of the void.
In a world gone backwards,
with violets cupping air in their tender petals,
purple passion shrinking,
by remembering that all came from nothing,
there is nothing to be lost.

Gone go the strivings, the voices,
the thunderbolts from high, the
notes that follow our fetal condition
and sound with an ever-mounting urgency:
yet
this trap-door is far from suicidal
if you let your self dissolve into dust.

It's rare to see grace -
a reed that moves with the wind -
yet I've seen it in human form but thrice:
my grandfather, arranging to sit before he
learned how to fall, and, his son,
my uncle, whose laughter makes
the inanimate glint and the animate twinkle.

Bipeds bustle but I see no meaning in the rest
those who insist that (no) they won't make the best
of what coil is left because (yes) their best
years are still ahead of them, as if,
through this invocation, time can and will be stilled.

Kyoto-sensei fills out this sonatic trio:
he once said, upon turning sixty,
he only lived now for soft sips of sake,
warmed, looking out from the farmhouse
whose construction calloused his grandfather's hands,
as snowflakes settled on the ground.

Now, watching through fogging windows,
this thought is a shooting star,
as the night snow crosses the (actual) sky,
fluttering to earth,
glinting and burning on the way down.

May all have the strength to live star-like
and may all find courage
to allow the light to fade
thinks the one who smiles, sits,
and sips in gathering imitation
as a white blanket puts soil to sleep.

Proof

Marijuana tied

to memory problems - what

was I gonna say?

Ballad of the One-Eyed Buddha

First his wife gone, then daughter married
and tarried, then just him,
a one-eyed Buddha watching the shop till,
doing the same things in the same ways
and does not see how
wondering made the growth in his wife grow bigger,
how the off-eye pushed his daughter away,
and a legacy comes from what you give.

With sun skulking skyward
and heat thickening the everyday air,
he possesses himself (under his hat)
and potters down the street,
dropping money in outstretched palms
while on some level knowing
the soul he'd save would be his own.

O education: does any classroom
teach you what hollows the place beneath your eyes?
If it were a class, he would surely take it now.
Beauty exists as an ideal - touching it,
he feels, would disinegrate it to dust -
and his mouth pipe, his mother's teet,
helps puff away anything that
falls short of worldly perfection.

Of shortness, there remains multitudes
but still he prays: for love, for honor,
for richness of mind and pocket,
and nearly forgets that doing so
requires an opening of the heart.

He thinks he is crying without tears;
seeing without engaging.
The heavens open in response,
and the crags and creases on his
doubly-weathered face are awash with raindrops
that mingle with the better part of a lifetime
spent,
and the tears that have become of it.

Act Of Creation

On the ropes
oh-boy-does-life-add-up,
building and
building and
building a
story told orally
or written on tissues
stained by pure red ink and
every past moment walling
you in, closing
closing - can you feel it?
Can you dig? deep,
in the ooze,
the birthplace of you,
spent days and nights
spent battling
the rattling ghosts
in your dreams.
This is not about the moment;
no longer concerns power, nay~
this has everything to
do with peering into mirror
and respecting who looks back,
be able, willing to, and ready to
focus, yes! - only
this will turn swimming-in-blue
to surfacing. And so,
when it is your "time" the
angels shall come sit upon your
chest as you rest, smiling,
stroking your head as a signal.
Never has providence been so divine.
Is it your time?
Is it your "time"?

您要不要演奏 at the Smithsonian

And here, displayed beneath spotlights
are truths with stolen shadows,
the privilege of America:
strong arms and Space Shuttles
flight pods and Wright Brothers
every last one of them pale.

The Machinery of Democracy
touts one new exhibit
as if the chosen were anything new.

Mixed in with moon walking
and founding fathers
are new found pieces:
- shopkeeper internment and cold winter counts
- African Voices under one title harmonious
- determined women in Seneca Falls
- posters from the occupied Orient
and then, with a smile,
a little something about mail service for
a nation's promise left so undelivered.

Though color has snuck into
textbooks like seep, it is small.
Forget the the "Posters American Style" show:
the bullets above are graphic images.
From these cultural sweatshops
sprung award-winners and heroes,
artists with visions,
what will the next fifty bring
when those who've done without
really do with?

Leaders see through filters, self-visions of color,
what's implied is thus:
some must be in
some must be out,
as if binary thinking's a must.

And to those on the out:
don't ire, don't pout because
your history month shall come,
ghettoizing time for some
even as clock bells toll for all.

May distinction without difference
be found on the playground:
may a white child approach
a newcomer with almond eyes
and say, in Chinese,
would you like to play?

May the checker at 7-11
need no adjective to stereotype
his manhood.

May the factory worker
be denoted not by
ethnicity but skill;
may his wife be talked
about for her compassion,
not her religion -
and may it be just when
the company becomes theirs.

The earth is bound,
believe it my friend,
and it will hold firm
as we address one
another, eye-to-eye,
and grant humanity
to all. Only then
can we dismiss,
lay down, or put to
rest the very notion
that the Earth is flat -
an appropriate way
to begin again.

The Anti Cut-Up

This makes me so much more nervous,"
actress Jessica Alba said backstage,
looking every inch the starlet
in a slim black sweater and
pleated white skirt.
"I'm glad I wore the shoes though."

The above was courtesy of Yahoo.
March 5, 2006.

This is the essence of Alba,
the glam slam, the girl
with the talent agency
giving a big big push to
a girl so desparate to appear
serious that she'll sue
Playboy for naming her
the most desirable girl
in Hollywood as the mag
shows her in a
bikini that she seems only
too ready to take off.

Beauty is skin deep;
dumb is forever.
Miss Alba:
have you strapped
your thinking cap on?

乘驾象诞生 (A Ride Like Birth)

Enwombed in fluid,
it is amazing that we
find the light a'tall
and each ray
stands remembered.

Each moment of
ray and revelation
stands for something,
whether it be particles
and luck, the way
the sun silhouetted
a body, or the wind
whipping and untangling
your hair.

Memories are built on
the moments that make
the void a shade brighter.
The whole of it is a ride
like birth
with a thrust you only
think you can control,
the tumult spilling into
the next curve
and the next.

Swimming in amniotica
I can not fail.
A gryffin comes in
dreamscape, grins,
and tells me this as
I scrounge for ground
-bound change, falsely
believing that I can buy
a ticket for the next
ride.

Outside the womb,
leaves plummet,
ever-so-softly, while
wind winds through
branches, ever-so-
randomly. My sighting
this only spawns a
smile; thus, I realize
I am alive.

Sometimes, too much so.
At times I chant for chaos
the way yahoos might chant
"Defense" on a late Sunday
afternoon for many
reasons, if only
because the ataxia
will later give me
something to put on paper.

On The Underside Nothing Grows

The tat
covered his
back in the
same way
six elephants
discussed how
every human
they'd stepped on
seemed flat
for the only
native he'd
known was
his birth dad,
who gave sperm
and alcohol
before walking
back to Tennessee.
His mom traded
for a new model
made of pure anger
whom all made
sure never to
call less than
Mister. That
still just don't
explain the
full spread
eagle stretching
from blade to
blade on his
reddened back
that merged
with a poison
idea of fun
and a pure sense
of rage passed
by blood from
his step-dad.
No one noticed
he was inked
save the ones
he wanted
with gnarled
yellow locks
and without
the years to
tell them
how drink and
rage had given
birth to metallic
clamps digging
in to untouched
nipples and
(gradually)
wondrous ways
to control the
windpape via
digging fingers
and horserope
twisted just so.
A dye job
marked "Daffodil"
only dissonated
the outer from
inner because
the guy we
loved and the
dude we thought
we knew bedded
half the gene pool
and never got
noticed for
doing something
so stupid as
piercing his
scrote after
the only
book he ever
read claimed it
could delay
orgasm while
you still
kept it up
yet it was
the trickster
in him who
firestarted
this little idea
that left another
person-round-the-campfire
with swollen balls
and shriveled pride.
That was influence.
That was him.
There should have
been more.
Since then I have
met many in
his league but
now look back
at his flatness
with the misery
of seeing someone
so unaware that
the shadow above
that cloaked the
tribal tat upon
his back
was the underside
of an elephant's
foot and I wonder
if he ever wondered
how twilight came
so goddamned early.

Feedback

It takes a long time
to bleed your own
and she
made me see red
running down milk
stained skin just
by standing there,
honky-tonk
band polluting the
dance floor with
tourists yet
sounding very
much like
her very own
backup band.
When I congratulated
her, she asked why,
then unbelieved
as I told her what
she had.
Suddenly
the drummer had
a double bass and
the guitar feedback
drowned the rest as
her mouth moved
forcefully enough
to fleck spit,
to hide shame,
to turn and
walk onto a
dancefloor
where tourists
in shiny shitkicker
boots were baffled
by the opening
strains of "Wipeout"
while she strutted
out the door,
adamant that
she did not, could
not, would never
have had an
opportunity to
get vee-dee.